A fitting death for an old friend

On the last day of the year 2010 (just in time, for tax purposes!) we bought an new vehicle and said goodbye to our old red Tahoe.  The Tahoe was nearly 10 years old, Jason bought it while we were dating in 2001.  I was on my 2 month cooking internship in Michigan at the time and he didn't tell me he bought it.  After our what seemed to be a forever long separation, I flew to Arizona to meet him for our friends Jesse and Cassandra's wedding.  As we walked in the parking garage with my bags, Jason came up to a red Tahoe in the parking garage and started looking at it and admiring it (I knew he had wanted a Tahoe for a long time).  He then tried opening the door and exclaimed "Oh my gosh, its open!"  To my disbelief, he climbed inside and then said the keys were still inside!  He started it up and Jesse hopped in the passenger side.  I was completely disgusted at their behavior and started walking away.  They drove up to me telling me to get in and I refused.  Of course the admitted they were pulling my leg and that Jason had actually bought the vehicle just days before.  I had no idea, we had been talking every day and he never said anything about it!  It was pretty funny.  I am so easy to tease, and Jason loves to give me a hard time whenever possible.

In New Mexico on our way back after Jesse and Cassandra's wedding

Anyway, that was my first introduction to the Tahoe.   It took us to Half Moon Bay where Jason proposed to me on my birthday.  It drove us to the airport to get us to our wedding (which we had drive to make it to 3 flights and 2 different airports because we missed our flights!), it transported supplies as Jason's first construction vehicle, it commuted me to and from work every day before we started our family, it was were all of our kids rode first ride home from the hospital, pulled our boat many times, and took the kids to school and activities.
It also went through some hard times.  It had it's tires stole from it and left on cinderblocks, had its window broken when someone decided to steal a case (containing scriptures) sitting on the seat inside, and was smoke damaged inside our garage through TWO house fires (two separate houses).  So when I received a letter from California Highway Patrol only a month after we traded it in, I was not completely surprised to read that they had found our Tahoe stollen and towed in Salinas, CA.  Across the paper it read

"total fire damage, no salvageable parts".      

Goodbye old friend!  Thanks for all the good times, we will miss you!